In what surely must be the third sign of the impending apocalypse (Sony and Nintendo were one and two, respectively), video game industry icon Sega Corp. is hacked for information on 1.3 million of its users. And just when you thought the world hadn’t gotten any stranger, hacktivist group LulzSec offers assistance to the creators of Sonic the Hedgehog.
What a year it’s been for the video game industry! If this article was written in simpler times, it would probably focus on the upcoming fall season and the spending orgy that comes right after fall (what’s it called? Christmas?). We’d be discussing console and game sales, hot new pending releases, the growth of online gaming, the industry’s latest attempts at reinventing the game controller, and the industry’s overall dedication to things that explode, bounce, or go blip blip. But like the 1960’s, these aren’t simple times and they aren’t ever coming back.
One would think that gaming giants like Sony and Nintendo could manage a basic task like keeping their doors locked and blinds drawn, and one would be wrong; but lest you think that they’re alone, look no further than another venerable icon in the game development world, Sega Corp., which this week announced that they, too, had been hit by the bug that of late seems to have a nasty habit of popping up on a weekly basis. “Names, birth dates, e-mail addresses and encrypted passwords of users of Sega Pass online network members had been compromised,” Sega said in a statement on June 19th, also indicating that while no credit card information had been compromised, a whopping 1.3 million user accounts were breached. Add this to the tally of an estimated 100 million plus PSN, Qriocity and Sony BMG Music users and you have yourself a startling amount of personal information floating out there in the cloud. (Nintendo got off easily: LulzSec ‘merely’ posted a server configuration file on their site to show that they could hack Nintendo if they so desired).
Recognizing that not all of the players have been so forthcoming, and in the spirit of giving credit where credit is due, hats off to Sega for getting in front of this one and coming clean. “We are deeply sorry for causing trouble to our customers,” said Sega spokesperson Yoko Nagasawa. “We want to work on strengthening security.”
So, is it coincidence that all three gaming companies are Japan-based? Probably. But it isn’t coincidental that some of the biggest names in the gaming software world have been compromised by a variety of groups – Anonymous and LulzSec have laid claim to the Sony breaches, and as mentioned, LulzSec felt the need to point out a security flaw in Nintendo’s security, but so far no one has taken responsibility for Sega. Of this, however, we are certain: it probably wasn’t LulzSec.
How can we be sure that it wasn’t LulzSec? Well, in a bizarre twist of events, LulzSec has come forth to offer its assistance in tracking down the perpetrator. On June 17th the group posted to Twitter: “@Sega – contact us. We want to help you destroy the hackers that attacked you. We love the Dreamcast, these people are going down.”
Frontier Justice?
Whether Sega takes LulzSec up on the offer is anybody’s guess (‘probably not’ is the consensus here), but the group that targeted the U.S. Government after President Obama made hacking a declaration of war just can’t seem to get its philosophical mojo in sync with its actions. LulzSec has stated that their attack on Sony was a blow in the name of solidarity after Sony declared its own war on iPhone hacker extraordinaire, George Hotz, better known as GeoHot. But in what felt like an “I love you, man!” moment, LulzSec seemed almost honorable in its hack on Nintendo, stating publicly that they simply wanted to make Nintendo aware of its own vulnerabilities. Now that Sega has been hacked, however, LulzSec wants to help because they clearly like Sega (or, at least, the Dreamcast). It feels like frontier justice, the Old West approach to settling a beef, and while some might applaud LulzSec’s attempt at heroism, one cannot help but wonder: “what happens if I tick these guys off?”
What, indeed. LulzSec has declared its own war, but just who is the enemy seems to be the burning question. On June 15th, LulzSec posted to Twitter: “Tango down – cia.gov – for the lulz.” According to the International Business Times, “The site of the CIA, which engages in covert activities at the request of the President of the United States, was back two hours later. The CIA has not revealed that valuable information was stolen.” And on June 13th, the group took on the U.S. Senate website, stating “We don’t like the US government very much. Their boats are weak, their lulz are low, and their sites aren’t very secure. In an attempt to help them fix their issues, we’ve decided to donate additional lulz in the form of owning them some more!”
Where does it all end? This week, LulzSec released a manifesto of sorts, as the group celebrated its 1,000th Tweet with a letter that reads like it was co-written by Charlie Sheen. “Yes, yes, there’s always the argument that releasing everything in full is just as evil, what with accounts being stolen and abused, but welcome to 2011…We’ve been entertaining you 1000 times with 140 characters or less, and we’ll continue creating things that are exciting and new until we’re brought to justice, which we might well be.” Justice may eventually be LulzSec’s endgame, but until then, “this is the lulz lizard era, where we do things just because we find it entertaining.”
Entertaining? Really? Hey, Sonic the Hedgehog! See if you can escape the nasty trap that Dr. Robotnik set for you! Now that’s entertaining.